BACK IN London, I found no peace. I had fled before my destiny like a malefactor before his crime. How painful it must have been for a family so worthy of my respect and gratitude to have suffered this rejection by a poor unknown, a man whom they had welcomed into their house with a simplicity, an absence of suspicion and precaution, that seemed to have been handed down from the ancients! I imagined Charlotte’s grief and all the well-deserved reproaches that could and should be heaped on my head: for the fact was that I had complacently abandoned myself to an inclination whose insurmountable illegality I well understood. Was it true then that I had vaguely attempted to seduce Charlotte without holding myself accountable for this culpable conduct? But whether I stopped myself, as I did, in order to remain an honest man, or overcame all obstacles in order to surrender to a desire blighted in advance by my conduct, I could only have plunged the object of this seduction into regret or sorrow.
From these bitter reflections, I let my mind wander to no less bitter feelings: I cursed my marriage, which, according to the false perceptions of my mind, then quite disturbed, had thrown me off course and deprived me of happiness. I did not give any thought to the possibility that, because of the melancholy nature with which I am afflicted and the romantic notions of liberty by which I lived, a marriage with Miss Ives might have been as painful for me as a more independent union.
One thing remained pure and enchanting to my mind, although the thought of it made me profoundly sad: the image of Charlotte. This image would finally subjugate my rebellions against fate. A hundred times I was tempted to return to Bungay, going not to present myself to the baffled family but to hide by the roadside and watch Charlotte walk past; to follow her to the temple where we had the same God, if not the same altar, in common; to offer this woman, through the medium of heaven, the inexpressible ardor of my vows; to pronounce, at least in thought, that nuptial blessing which, if life had led me otherwise, I might have heard from the mouth of a pastor in this same temple.
Wandering from resolution to resolution, I wrote Charlotte long letters that I tore to shreds. The few insignificant notes I had received from her served me as talismans; conjured to my side by my thoughts, Charlotte, gracious and tender, followed me, purifying my every step, along the paths of my sylph. She absorbed my faculties; she was the center through which all my thoughts passed, as all the blood passes through the heart. She made me disgusted with everything, for I was constantly drawing comparisons to her advantage. A genuine and unhappy passion is a poisonous leaven that lingers in the depths of the soul and would spoil the bread of the angels.
The places where I had walked and the hours and words I had exchanged with Charlotte were engraved in my memory. I gazed at the smile of the woman who had been destined for me; I respectfully touched her black hair; I pressed her lovely arms to my chest like a chain of lilies that I might have worn around my neck. No sooner was I in a secluded spot than Charlotte, with her fair hands, would come sit by my side: I divined her presence, as at night one breathes the fragrance of flowers which he does not see.
Deprived of Hingant’s company, my strolls, more solitary than ever, left me quite free to carry with me the image of Charlotte. There is not a heath, a road, or a church within thirty miles of London which I have not visited. The most forsaken places, a nettle patch, a ditch planted with thistles—anywhere that had been neglected by men—became the places I preferred: the same places where Byron had already breathed. With my head in my hand, I contemplated these sites that men had scorned, and when their painful impression became too much to bear, the memory of Charlotte came to ravish me. I was then like the pilgrim who, after wandering many days in the desert, beheld the rocks of Sinai and heard the nightingale’s song.
In London, my manners aroused surprise. I looked at no one; I did not reply to anyone; I did not understand what was being said to me. My old friends suspected I had gone mad.